Page:Forty years of it (IA fortyyearsofit00whitiala).pdf/25

 The prisoner smiled, a smile exactly like that anyone would have for such a question, but the smile flickered from his face, as he said:

"Yes, your honor."

My grandfather looked out over the Square and up and down. There was no one anywhere to be seen.

"Well, come on into the office."

The prisoner picked up his ball, and followed my grandfather into the mayor's office. My grandfather went to a desk, drew out a drawer, fumbled in it, found a key, and with this he stooped and unlocked the irons on the prisoner's ankles. But he did not remove the irons—he seated himself in the large chair, and leaned comfortably against its squeaking cane back.

"Now," my grandfather said, "you go out there in the Square—be careful not to knock the leg irons off as you go,—and you sweep around for a little while, and when the coast is clear you kick them off and light out."

The creature in the drab rags looked at my grandfather a moment, opened his lips, closed them, swallowed, and then

"You'd better hurry," said my grandfather, "I don't know what minute the marshal-"

The prisoner gathered up his ball, hugged it carefully, almost tenderly, in his arms, and, with infinity delicacy as to the irons on his feet, he shuffled carefully, yet somehow swiftly out. I saw him an instant in the brilliant glittering sunlight framed by the door; he looked back, and then he disappeared,